I don't know why it never occurred to me that Filipino turo-turo (“point-point”) food is a perfect fit for a mall food court. You almost never see Filipino food in malls, even though you see takes on Chinese, Japanese and Hawaiian.
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Laguna Hills Mall's creepy upstairs food court (it's the only thing
upstairs, and it's just plain dark and weird) has a lot of shuttered posts, but of the five places open, one had a long line:
Pinoy Pam's Best, a Filipino steam-tray restaurant that could have been
any of our local places (Manila Groove, Kapit Bahay, etc.).
I'd already eaten lunch, so I can't tell you whether the food was any
good, but it certainly looked and smelled appetizing: a couple of types
of pancit (stir-fried noodles that put lo mein to shame), fish in
coconut milk, afritada, lechon kawali, chicken adobo, bitter melon, and a station for fried
goods — whole fish, lumpia Shanghai and turon (fried banana egg rolls). They were serving ube shakes made to order, as well. I asked some folks who were eating the food what they thought; they said it wasn't mom's cooking, but nothing is.
There are thousands of Filipino-Americans in Orange County; why are there not more Filipino food in malls to give
the Japanese and Hawaiian steam-tray restaurants a
run for their money?
